I think you're correct. my buddy flipped with his bimini on (stowed down) in Horn Creek. Nylon connection was undamaged. He had a couple of the rivets in the aluminum tubes pop, but he fixed it and it's still going strong. You can always replace them with these if they blow out.
As far as width, I think you can tweak the angle of the mounts on the frame to align with the fittings and tubes. If it was me, I would err with going wider and have the mounts canted slightly outward. Every inch of shade counts!
How big is your boat, and how tall are you? I inherited a 3 bow when I bought my used raft setup and quickly determined that it wasn't big or tall enough. It didn't cast as much shade as I wanted, and I couldn't stand up straight to scout with it up (I'm 6'1"). I got an 8' four bow off Amazon and am much happier. Tall "Better Mounts" are money...

 

Solid insight. And sounds like I might need to think 8' rather than 6'. It's a 16' boat and I'm 6'2". My motivation for the 6' was having plenty of room in the front of the boat to stand and scare fish with my fly rod. But I might be able to still get that by adjusting the mounting position.

 

I replaced the front straps with a set of loop cam straps with metal rings on the tail end from Strapworks. I put the short cam buckle piece on the Bimini. This lets me quickly drop it from my rower zone. I used longer straps for the other side. This lets me “recline” the whole Bimini when I’m parked and the sun is lower angle and my shade is out in the river. I stop as soon as the back bar touches the tube. I imagine you could recline it for clearance while fishing.

 

Another pic of later setup on the river - went to a blue top.

 

If you want to use a bimini that is significantly wider or narrower than your boat, canting the mounts may help when the bimini is up, but does nothing to help the angle when you fold the bimini down, so keep your angles reasonable.
I run nylon fittings and have been happy with them. Just don't expect ANY part of the bimini to fair well if you flip and it isn't stowed properly. This can be an entrapment hazard, so I always stow mine for anything that looks remotely spicy.

Cheers!

-Thomas

 

I replaced the front straps with a set of loop cam straps with metal rings on the tail end from Strapworks. I put the short cam buckle piece on the Bimini. This lets me quickly drop it from my rower zone. I used longer straps for the other side. This lets me “recline” the whole Bimini when I’m parked and the sun is lower angle and my shade is out in the river. I stop as soon as the back bar touches the tube. I imagine you could recline it for clearance while fishing.
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@Senior D. I really like this strap set up. Do you thread the rings through the bolts on your bikini and use a carabiner on the order side? I assume you called Strapworks for a custom product. I am not finding this nice strap set up

 

Sorry, I just saw this, and Senior D is my father .

I ordered this option from Strapworks. My Bimini has a screw to hold the strap it came with on the bimini side. I removed the screw and replaced the existing strap with the ring end that has the cam on it. I glued a small d ring patch to my raft a little wider than my frame so the paco pad on the front doesn't hang up on the bimini straps. I attached the long tail end to the d ring with a carabiner. That way I can completely remove the strap if I'm stowing the bimini for the long haul and not have a loose strap trailing in the water.
Hope this makes sense!